Monday, 25 July 2011

Unknown

Film/DVD

A film that has played heavy on the ‘if you liked Taken, you’ll love this’ idea, perhaps simply because it has the ever gigantic Liam Neeson in another suited-up race around a European city action adventure.

It opens with Neeson and his wife, the constant beauty January Jones, arriving in Berlin. As they reach their hotel Neeson realises his case has been left at the airport and taxi’s back to retrieve it. Involved in a crash, Neeson wakes from a coma only to find that someone else is living his life for him. He has no ID, his wife doesn’t recognise him and there is an impostor who seems to have all his memories.

Linking up with the driver who saved his life, the perfectly charming Diane Kruger, Neeson must unravel the mystery before his life crumbles around him.

It is not Taken. Yes, it is quite gripping, there are a few good action sequences and a couple of twists, but the similarities end here. There is an appallingly shot car chase which makes me question if director Jaume Collet-Serra was just having a bad week. It is so car-interior heavy that I actually felt a little queasy.

The twists are simple and predictable, and Neeson doesn’t have any of the power, determination and presence that we delighted in with Taken. In fact, I’d even go so far as to say Neeson is quite weak in this – I never felt that he was genuinely afraid, horrified, or even that confused by his situation.

I did actually enjoy it, but I was certainly left wanting more. It was all just a bit off the boil. Perhaps this is the filmic equivalent of ordering a Vindaloo and being served a Korma, all a bit too creamy and soft for what I was hoping.